Palustrine carbonates and pedogenic calcretes in the Çal basin of SW Anatolia: Implications for the Plio-Pleistocene regional climatic pattern in the eastern Mediterranean

•Landscapes in the Çal Basin were dominated by C3 plants with increase in C4 plants.•Pedogenic carbonates and calcretes give information about regional climatic changes.•The carbonates imply regional to global climatic change during the Plio-Pleistocene.•The δ13C/fauna data show a shift from Pliocene subhumid to Pleistocene arid climate.•C3-vegetation imply regional/global climatic change with a onset of the neotectonic.

Sedimentologic and stable isotopic studies in the Çal basin-fill provide new insights on the late Neogene–Quaternary climatic pattern in the eastern Mediterranean. Long-term subsidence and terrestrial sedimentation in the basin beginning in the late Miocene are recorded in alluvial fan and fluvial deposits overlain by Pliocene palustrine carbonates. An erosional unconformity separates the Pleistocene siliciclastic and calcrete deposits above as a single sedimentary unit resting on top of floodplain fines and restricted to the basin center.The stable isotopic analysis of the palustrine carbonates and pedogenic calcretes displays a wide range of values (− 7.98 < δ18O < − 6.38‰ and − 8.89 < δ18O < − 7.06‰, respectively) and the lack of significant δ18O–δ13C covariance (r = 0.59 and 0.24) may indicate subhumid conditions or significant diagenetic alteration. The δ13C values of these carbonates (− 7.71 < δ13C < − 4.08‰ and − 9.15 < δ13C < − 6.17‰, respectively), organic δ13C data from calcretes (− 27.88 and − 24.57‰, average value: − 26.53‰), and floral remains indicate that the landscapes were dominated by C3 forest plants.